LETTERS: I refer to your article "Prepare children for the 5G era" (NST, Feb 14).
Children are now growing up with technology, and computational thinking and coding are essential to them in the Fourth Industrial Revolution era.
The Education Ministry should review its policy on curriculum, as well as the critical skills and knowledge to be taught to primary schoolchildren.
The British and the Japanese employ the Estonian Model in teaching coding as a compulsory subject in primary level.
It is vital to teach computational thinking to boost a child's analytical skills. A well-planned computer science curriculum will provide a positive learning environment in early childhood education, where children can "play to learn while learning to play", thus promoting a coding playground and not a coding playpen.
The advantage of teaching coding from young spurs children to think, analyse and be creative in the use of technology in their educational and career journey.
Coding not only focuses on problem-solving processes in acquiring computational thinking skills. It also provides children with new ways to express themselves and support their cognitive, language and socio-emotional development in computational fluency via programming lessons, puzzles and challenges.
Our schoolchildren must be exposed to developmental tools and practices, as well as a coding environment.
Children need to be equipped with computational artifacts that can be shared with others. They need to have a range of computational literacy skills, from beginner to expert stage.
This 5G era has led governments, researchers, policymakers and stakeholders to call for a computational infrastructure, accessibility, connectivity, education, promotion and a policy on compulsory education and standardised examinations.
New initiatives to introduce computer literacy to schoolchildren and citizens have been undertaken by companies, universities and non-profit organisations.
Prominent business and IT billionaires such as Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and other technology figures promote code learning as a basis for wholesome development just like reading, writing and arithmetic.
C. SATHASIVAM SITHERAVELLU
Seremban, Negri Sembilan
The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times